Stop Stringing when 3d printing! How to reduce or solve stringing on a 3d printer -cura or otherwise

love the hobby, and it is very much a hobby but i look forward to the day when all these lil issues are ironed out and we dont have to constantly fiddle.

Meshmixer has an option to keep both halves in a plane cut, you can then turn off one of the objects (one of the halves) by clicking the eye and export it so you'll have one half in one file, then do the same for the other half.

What about a loose nozzle. I have had several instances where I had stringing because my nozzle wasn't tight 😅

Set retraction off and you have 95% faulty print jobs when printing complex objects.

Sincerely
Prusa MK3S+

I'm trying to print one of those print-in-place telescoping sword models and my parts are sticking to each other because of stringing.
This video helped me figure it out some. I completely forgot about temperature.

I'm trying to print that small pikachu, so as soon I saw the preview of your video I immediatwely clicked on it!! 🙂
I have stringing...a lot of stringing, but on double pyramid test too.
No matter retraction settings or a new filament. Nooze seems fine.
The main stuff I'm seeing is that PLA is oozing too much and I can print even PLA+ at 180° with strings. It's like I set a temperature but my nozzle is actually hotter than expected... 😞
I don't think I have a blocked nozzle 'cause walls are really nice and no signs of underextrusion: just a very fluid filament

E step?

you should make an extension that adds functions to fix stringing and other problems. post the problem and get the menu with the relevant settings. problem solving menu

Image: A model of a low-poly squirrel completely covered in strings and blobs. Question: "Hey guys why is this stringing" Answer: "Idiot."

Descant, won't technically remove moisture already absorbed by filament. It will reduce the addition of an more ambient moisture. Heat is the only real way to expel already absorbed moisture.

For this video to be perfect, the only thing that is left is Linear Advance.

You’re a fuckin legend for my ADHD decision-anxiety ass. THNKA YOU

My prints are getting zits when printing inside walls and outside walls because the printer stops at the end of each pass

Great video, however tried all of this and still get stringing, next!

Hello, I can't find your video about the adjustment screw on the extruder that you mentioned.

suggestions on programs to chop models into pieces to elimate print issues?

i love your videos and they are thorough. I have to literally make sure I have time to take notes and pay attention but they are very useful. Thanks!

Retraction acceleration can cause problems.

I noticed following behavior in Slic3r: Prints line -->wipes -->RETRACTS?!?! -->hops in Z and prints next colum.
WFT of course this will cause stringing. It should Print -->retract-->wipe and then move over
Unfortunately I seem to not be able to find out how to change this behavior.

I changed the .4 nozzle to a .6mm on my ender 3 s1 and it started stringing like crazy. Otherwise it's all good and nice looking, faster, etc.

Very thorough. I had a stringing issue and the only thing which worked was to use a dehydrator. A good video would be to cover that and maybe quantify how we can tell if its dry enough. I don't really want to run my oven for 4hrs for filament.

Thanks alot for a good topic!
I have done everything and i can't print TPU without massiv stringing!
The funny thing was that my original bowden setup on my CR6-SE made perfect prints(No stringing at all) in TPU as long as the filament didn't escaped the extruder which happen to often!
I then decided to purchase a Bontech LGX lite with a mosquito hotend and now the trouble begins with no end in sight!

I have tried everything i can come up with!
E-step is calibrated
Flow is calibrated
I have runned i think 10 different temp tower tests
Retraction tests is useless as no settings change the stringing

I have mounted and dismounted and mounted again to check if i did something wrong but no.
Filament is dried even when it was new i dried it for 4 hours with no change.

Is it the hotend which suck this bad with TPU ? Had no issue before and im blaming the hotend i think

I would recommend the Micro Swiss direct drive upgrade. It just makes those injection problems negligible. Retraction distance is tiny compared to Bowden tubes, so stringing is easily to adjust.

Your approach to printing issues is very informative! Please keep videos flowing!!

I think u'r saving me, for two weeks I'm trying to dail in my printer and I have suvier stringing and holes in model, Iicke huge holes near zseam and sometimes even half of layer missing..... I'm using heavely modified ender 3. I need to change nozzle I think after your video... How is it only 500lickes after 17k views, there is literally more than couple of hours of googling compressed... Or even if not on ender, i do have Anet A8 that does make wierd stuff witch prints, that you showed here as wrong pressure, and it might be it... Thank u so much ♥️

Btw thought about linear advance calibration because I recently calibrated e-stops and I have no idea of it's even possible because my motherboard does have locked bootloader and I have marlin 1.0.1

Thanks fot the effort of making your video not only informative but also entertaining

BLESS your SOUL for this vid, and the clearly laid-out chapters. The blocked nozzle section is exactly my issue, and even though I've already guessed this was the problem, it's nice to see the validation

I've missed the music ;)
For me it seems to be mostly filament manufacturer (nearly never had stringing with Monofilament but I do with Plexiwire) and when I had esteps way low, there was also unusual amount of stringing.
Also having TPU video in the end screen and description would have helped ;)

The methodical nature of this video makes it one of the best on this subject I have seen so far. Smiley face.

I think that using a nozzle larger than 0.4, 0.6 for example may increase stringing.
Even printing at 0.2 layer height with a 0.4 and a 0.6 nozzles is different. As the 0.6 prints faster I increase the temperature from 200ºC to 207ºC, but I still have some extrusion

Thank you very much! Other "big" channel mostly talk about retraction settings and that didn't work for me. But you explained very well about many others cause and it enlighten me to do something. Thanks again 🙏

Awesome tip for the bowden tube attachment to the extruder: set the bowden tube up where you want it to be, how far past the fitting it sticks into the extruder. Then unscrew the fitting, and the heat the ptfe tube that sticks out past the fitting with a lighter, and stick an awl into the tube, so that it expands the tube. That'll prevent it from ever slipping on you again. Don't be shy when heating it, but don't overdo it. Maybe a good idea to practice on some leftover tube.

For splitting models just use 3d builder its way easier than meshmixer meshmixer is a bit much for chopping up models imo 3d builder is much simpler cleaner and worlds easier to understand for newbies

Travel speed and acceleration is something to take into account as well as Z hop

Tengo un problema con mi Ender 3v2. Imprime desfasado. Sabes que podría ser?

can you please share some of your profiles especially the fast ones and print in place

Friction in the PTFE tube can cause stringing as well as lead to under extrusion as well. I only discovered this after two weeks of head scratching and accounting for every variable possible.

Over extrusion can cause stringing as well, so making sure extruder E steps are calibrated correctly and that flow rate is correct is very important.

This one is definitely going in my troubleshooting category.

The Eolas snapping is fine, that's inherent to the brittleness, it bent before snapping, i had PLA that snapped on it's own on the roll, no interaction necessary, snaps like dry spaghetti, no bend whatsoever

I wonder to what degree it would be possible to develop a wider array of test prints designed to elicit specific failures more unambiguously.

As the video says: Try temperature tower as they use fairly little material

I'd be interested In the effects of cooling / designs.can you have to much cooling? Obviously it effects adhesion but what happens after that point?

Another thing that can cause extruder slipping is if the hot end is too close to the cold end. That is, if the heater block is too far up the threads. This can cause a lot of heat to migrate upwards and warm the filament enough to make it soften a little bit when a print is paused.

This is very informative and helpful as I do have a lot of strings with my prints.

Maybe this is obvious but I experienced severe stringing when going from 0.2 mm to 0.12 layer height. If you have the same problem one solution could be to drop your hotend temperature (10 C worked for me). With 0.12 mm the printer is extruding the filament more slowly and therefore it will get hotter than using 0.2 mm. This might also help when you are printing very slowly and have stringing.

ive noticed definitely the different types of PLA i use have had different stringing issues. This shiny green silk i have is sooo notorious for stringing even at a lower temp. While i have a black matte that doesnt string but tends to clog more easily. Its very frustrating but trial and error seem to be the best way to solve these sorts of problems for me.

But all this dont helped me :( the quality is very good but the stringing is much...

What do I do if I get no stringing on the little towers test, but strings like hell when I do a AIO Printer test on the two bent towers

can't your share cura profile for ender 3v2?